


Ferrous Feline

by AnonEhouse



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Animal Traits, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Crack Treated Seriously, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Not Captain America: The Winter Soldier Compliant, Not Thor: The Dark World Compliant, Partial Animal Transformation, Post Iron Man 3, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-05
Updated: 2014-02-05
Packaged: 2018-01-11 05:57:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1169518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonEhouse/pseuds/AnonEhouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony gets turned partly cat by a villain, with quite a few unforeseen, and mostly frustrating, changes beyond the obvious external things such as furry ears and a long black tail. The Avengers do their best to be supportive of him while they await a cure.</p><p>(There's a little explicit Steve/Tony nookie at the end, but not while Tony is catty.)</p><p>Based on an AvengerKink prompt, but me being me, it veered a bit. (I just found a gif of Tony with cat ears.<a href="http://www.pinterest.com/pin/175429347957029142"> Tony with wiggly black cat ears)</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	Ferrous Feline

(If you are reading this on any PAY site this is a STOLEN WORK, the author has NOT Given Permission for it to be here. If you're paying to read it, you're being cheated too because you can read it on Archiveofourown for FREE.)

Tony really hates being kidnapped. It's never fun, and while it's always a learning experience, there are some lessons better left to the imagination. If he keeps his mouth shut and doesn't try to knock off the blindfold maybe they'll think he's still unconscious and ignore him for a while, at least long enough for his headache to recede.

He can't remember how he wound up here, where ever here is. Whatever they did, gas? Drug dart? Something slipped into his food or drink? He can't remember the last thing he can remember. It sounds stupid even in his head, but then his head is full of thick gray fuzz and everything feels weird; sounds weird too in his heavy head and even his ears are aching and feel heavy. His spines aches, too, right down to his tailbone, a long, hard ache which... is good, because if it hurts, he's not paralyzed, right? He twitches his fingers and toes just a little to make sure. They move, but they feel thick and swollen and ache like the rest of him; muscles in places he didn't even think had muscles feel sore. His hands and ankles are tied in front of him and he's lying on his side on something like a thin mattress, which is maybe considerate, or maybe they want him handily mobile for reasons which even as fuzzy as his mind is, his brain is happy to supply in living color, with sound effects. He's naked, which just adds a whole world of 'no'.

His mouth is dry, so dry his tongue is itchy, and when he swallows he can feel his mustache moving; it's long enough to brush his face, which is weird and scary because it makes him wonder how much time he's missing, and what could be happening, could have happened. To other people, too. He's sure there are other people he should be worried about, but they're all hazy figures and voices in the gray fuzz.

He hears footsteps coming closer and tries not to tense, but then there's a stink that makes him sneeze. It's an outrageously expensive cologne, but one that reacts horribly with this user's body chemistry. Tony only knows one person both rich and stupid enough to wear it. "Juthin Hammer. Oh, my day juth got even bettah." Great, he can't even talk clearly.

Justin laughs, and it's even more grating than ever on his hyper-sensitive ears. "Tony, Tony, Tony! You don't know how glad I am to hear your voice!"

Another man speaks, sounding irritated. But then, he's standing in the same room as Hammer, who is a naturally irritating asshole. Tony is getting hives, just thinking about him. "I told you I had complete control of the process. You want him to understand; he can understand just fine."

"That's good. It wouldn't be any fun if he were an idiot. Well, no, it would be fun. It _will_ be fun." Hammer's smarmy voice and stink are suddenly right in Tony's face. "I'm going to enjoy you depending on me for everything. Begging me. Crawling at my feet."

Tony doesn't actually think about it, but his bound hands come up and his swollen fingers stretch, and he feels the resistance of flesh tearing. Hammer yells and falls back. Tony smells blood and he grins. "Fuck you, Hammer."

"You don't get it, do you, Tony, my pet?" Hammer sounds almost hysterical with glee. There are footsteps again, and the blood smell is close but the voice is coming from behind him, and then a hand grabs his ear. "I'm going to be fucking _you._ " The ache in Tony's ear escalates as Hammer pulls on it, pulls and Tony can feel it moving, stretching. He lifts his head, trying to reduce the pain. The blindfold is suddenly whipped off and he opens his eyes, but the light is dazzling and for a moment all he can see are white walls and the blinding gleam of chromed steel. The aseptic cleanliness makes his skin crawl. This isn't going to be the 'hey, let's half-drown the guy and shout at him' routine the Three Rings had devised. Admittedly, that wasn't a walk in the park, but they had only wanted to break his will, not his brain.

After going through the void and facing the loneliest death possible- even an astronaut stranded on the moon could have seen Earth- well, Tony's grasp on reality isn't always trustworthy. Maybe Hammer really can break him, drive him insane. He blinks rapidly. His vision is sharpening. Colors are a little odd but the glare is now manageable. Hammer pulls harder on Tony's ear, forcing him to arch up and turn. There's a mirror. Tony wants to think that it's a trick, not a mirror at all, but... something... computers could do things with images... he was sure they could. He had a computer who could... who could make a live-streaming image of Tony Stark with slit pupils and bristling foot-long black whiskers spread wide on his upper lip. It could add the slightly elongated incisors and the the fine white hairs on the raspberry pink tongue that was visible when he screamed. But it couldn't match the pain he feels when Hammer yanks on the large, triangular furry black ears that protrude from his hair.

"Hey," the other man says to Hammer while Tony is staring, transfixed with worse horror than the time he discovered a hunk of metal in his chest, "you wanna mess him up, that's your business, but I'm not going to hang around and watch. It's not my thing."

"I've already paid you," Hammer says sharply. "And he's not finished. You promised me..."

"Yeah, you paid me, like you paid the other guys to catch him. They didn't have to sit around on their hands afterward, just so you could have an audience. Tell you what, I'll just go get lunch and be back in a couple hours. Then I'll finish the process and he'll be a nice, dumb pussycat person you can keep in your basement or whatever."

It's still hard to think, but adrenaline is clearing Tony's mind. If this man leaves then there will only be Hammer. Tony could handle Hammer with one hand tied behind his back. Shouldn't be that much harder with both hands and feet tied in front of him. He struggles, enough to keep Hammer occupied, but not anywhere near as hard as he could. He aches, sure, but his muscles respond well.

"I'll pay you double!" Hammer shouts.

The man pauses. "Show me the money."

Tony yells and jerks against Hammer's hold, distracting him. "You'll get it later!" Hammer says.

"Right. Well, I'll come back and finish the job. And remember, if you try to stiff me, I could turn _you_ into a rat, and let the pussycat have his fun." Out of the corner of his eye, Tony sees the man hold up his hands. They're glowing in yellowish-green ripples for a moment. "Got it?"

"Yeah, yeah," Hammer says. The man goes out a heavy looking steel door. As it shuts, Hammer mutters, "Freak."

"Look whoth talkin'," Tony says. "Thith the only way you can get any puthy, right?"

"Shut up!" Justin pulls harder on Tony's hair, and then pins him down to the mattress. "You think you're so smart. You think you have friends because everyone laughs at your jokes. They're laughing at _you_ behind your back. You're no better than me. You're just fooling yourself if you think they're not in it for the money." Justin leans down on Tony's back. "Where were they when you needed them, huh? Where are they now?"

Tony growls, angry because in the back of his mind he'd been thinking the same thing and he's ashamed of himself. You don't lean on other people. It's too much for them; it had been too much for Pepper, his clinging and neediness, and it'd only got worse after he destroyed his suits and had the arc reactor removed and cut back on the drinking.

When you got right down to it, Tony Stark without the bad habits is a really boring person. He doesn't want to think about that. Doesn't want to remember the day Pepper had cried and.. not going to think about that, or about the ring he never gave her. He's glad now that Pepper's not with him to worry about him as a lover instead of a friend. He's glad that he's angry and has someone to fight.

"I don't need anyone!" Tony gathers himself and channels his anger into his muscles, pushing up with everything he has. It's easier than he thought it would be. Hammer doesn't just fall off, he's thrown back, hitting the nearby wall with an audible thump. Tony scrambles to his feet, awkward because of the bindings, and nearly falls over- nearly- something tugs at his backside and counterbalances him. He whirls, thinking it's Hammer, but... _A tail? God damn it, how am I gonna fit a tail in the suit?_ The tail is fluffed out and lashing from side to side, entirely beyond Tony's control. He sees Hammer, slumped against the wall, lips moving and eyes tracking blearily. Momentarily stunned, Tony figures.

Tony hops over to the nearest stainless steel cabinet, but he doesn't see anything useful on top. He pulls at drawers, but they're all locked. Any second now Hammer's going to wake up. Frustrated, Tony pulls his hands as far apart as they can go, and gnaws on the rope. His new teeth are sharp, but his bite strength doesn't seem to have increased. Hammer groans. Tony's not going to have time... he clenches his hands into fists and oh, hey. Extensible claws. Forgot about them. He crouches, and his tail swings out once again to balance him. The claws cut, and they loosen the rope.

He's almost got his feet free. Then he smells Hammer coming at him and dodges, but his feet are tangled in shredded loops of rope and before he can get out of the way, Hammer's on top of him again. Weirdly, instead of punching or choking him, Hammer's grabbing at the back of Tony's neck, pulling at the skin. The skin moves, actually pulls, and before Tony can think about the impossibility of that, he loses control of his muscles and falls to the floor. His jaw falls open; he can't even talk. What the hell? He can hear Hammer's gloating voice, all right, nothing wrong with his oversized furry ears.

"Yeah, thought that would work. Hey, kitten." Hammer keeps the skin pulled tight, keeps Tony paralyzed by the weird-ass cat nerve pinch. 

The good part of this, in Tony's view, is that Hammer's trapped here, too. He's got a tiger by the tail. Tony is wondering how long the stalemate will go on before it apparently occurs to Hammer that he could shift to holding on with one hand, and have the other free for other purposes. Tony has a bad feeling about that. And the sound of a trouser zip going down confirms it. He tries even harder to move, but all that happens is that his breathing speeds up. He can't even clamp his stupid tail down to cover his ass. The tail is in Hammer's way, though. Tony feels him tug on it, which is all sorts of unpleasantly wrong. Hammer curses, non-inventively- the man hasn't a creative bone in his body- and yanks harder. And then his grip on Tony's nape slips.

What happens next, happens so fast that later Tony can't remember the order of things or of thinking anything at all while it was happening. He was angry, and he was frightened, and... now there's blood on his claws and... Hammer is ... yeah. Dead. Tony has time now to work the rope off his hands and feet. He doesn't know where he is, but he's pretty sure where ever it is, a naked cat-man is going to draw unwelcome attention. And maybe that guy who said he was leaving for lunch really didn't leave. Or he's eating lunch within sight of this place. Tony goes to the door and barricades it by pushing the metal cabinets against it. Yeah, he's a lot stronger than he was, than he should be.

Tony pushes a few more things around until he's set up an obstacle course between him and the door. It's only then he realizes he's trapped himself in here, with Hammer's corpse. There's no other exit. No land-line, no computer. It's hard to think. Reluctantly he has to admit he needs some help. Bruce? Bruce would be good. Bruce could science at him. But how to call him? Oh. Hammer. He might have a cell. Tony prods Hammer with his toes before flipping him over and going through his pockets. His nose wrinkles and his whiskers flatten against his cheeks in disgust. Dead Hammer stinks even worse than live Hammer. 

Tony finds the cell and goes to the other end of the room to make the call. It's hard, his claws get in the way, and even when he hits the numbers he means to, he gets confused, and starts to call Pepper, before he remembers she's in Japan. He's pretty sure he's not in Japan. The... yeah, the wall outlets would be different. 

He tries again, and again, and finally the numbers feel right. "Bruth?"

"Tony! Are you all right? Where are you? Are you drunk?" 

Tony looks at the phone in confusion and then cautiously puts it back to his ear. "Bruth? You thound like Theeve."

"That's because you called me," Steve says. He sounds upset, but then he usually does. Tony likes Steve, but he's not sure why. "What's going on? Are you in trouble?"

"Uh. Yeth?" Tony looks at Hammer. Did he move? Should Tony kill him again? "I've been catnapped."

"Kidnapped?"

"Um. Thure. That, too." Tony's fingers are sticky. He doesn't like that, it distracts him. "I don't know where I am. Um... ith a room with Hammer." Tony can hear people talking in the background over the phone, and the sound of someone moving quickly.

"Carpenter's shop?" Steve asks.

"No, no. Juthin Hammer. He catnapped me. I killed him. I think. Pretty thure. There'th a lot of blood." Tony's feet have blood on them, too. It's disgusting. His tail sweeps irritably. 

He can hear Steve talking softer, as if he's turned from the phone to someone else. "Can Jarvis track this call?" And then Steve is back, and Tony is glad of it. He slides down to sit on the floor with his tail curled around his legs, and tries not to think about the blood on his fingers, which he's getting all over Hammer's phone. It's a crappy phone, anyway. Steve says, "Tony, stay on the line. Don't hang up. We're going to come for you."

"Uh huh." Tony flexes his fingers and watches the claws go in and out. "I need a bath."

"You can have one as soon as you get back." Steve sounds like he's running. Again he talks to someone in the background which annoys Tony. Tony should be the center of attention.

"THEVE!" Tony says loudly. "I'm hungry, too! I want a cheethburger!" He leans back and thumps his head against the wall. "Theve? I can't think tho good. I'm... it'th not good. There wath a man. He did it." Tony lies down and curls up around the phone. "He did it to me."

"What did he do?" Now it sounds like Steve is on the quinjet. And there's Bruce's voice and... the other two. The scary woman and her friend. There should be someone else? Maybe. It's getting so hard to think, it makes him tired.

"Catnapped me." Tony absentmindedly licks his fingers; his tongue curling around the claws to clean them. Blood doesn't taste that bad, really. "He went to lunth before he finithed. He'th not here, now." Tony is really tired. "Gonna nap." Tony lays the phone down, but he doesn't turn it off.

"Nap? No, don't, stay awake, Tony."

"Bored," Tony sniffs his fingers and licks them some more.

"Tony!" Steve sounds upset. "You need to stay awake." Tony yawns and inspects his claws. Much less Justiny.

"No," Tony says, and shuts his eyes. "Double bacon cheethburger." He covers his ears with his hands and goes to sleep.

***

Tony wakes up in a panic. Someone is shouting his name from the cell phone. Why? Are they angry with him? He tucks himself in tightly under one of the overturned cabinets and pulls his tail in and holds it because it's thumping against the floor. His ears are laying flat against his head, and they refuse to come up. He can still hear the voice. Maybe they'll forget about him and go away if he's quiet.

There's a loud, loud noise that hurts his ears. It's so loud he can feel it in his bones. Something big and angry is roaring and smashing the things Tony had put against the door. He can't run away, so he braces himself to fight. The cabinets and tables and boxes are hurled to either side of where the door used to be. A huge green man steps in, shouldering aside the mess, and bends down to peer at Hammer and poke him with a finger bigger than Tony's whole hand, even counting his spread claws. Tony gathers himself and leaps out of hiding, scrambling on top of the green man's shoulder and then past him out into a corridor, past other people who shout and throw things at him, but he's fast and he's getting away, he's going to make it, but he turns a corner, and there's no door, no window, no way to go on. He whirls and crouches, hissing, feeling his hair standing on end from the top of his head, down his back and to his tail. Three people stand there, almost blocking the corridor. Behind them he can make out the head of the big green man.

"Tony?" 

Tony straightens and his ears come up. "Theve? You look thrange."

"I look strange?" Steve moves slowly closer to Tony. He's holding his shield and that looks strange too. 

"Yeth, you're all blue and gray." The scary woman has dark gray hair and her friend, the man with the arrows, is purple, but dull. Tony's whiskers fan out and he sniffs in disappointment. "No cheethburger?"

Steve glances at scary and her friend. The big green man makes a noise, and pushes the others out of his way. Tony's ears go down, but then they come back up. Big green man looks right. It reminds him. Of someone. "Bruth? I need thienth." Tony is confused. "It'th hard to think," he confesses. 

"HULK KNOWS." The big green face looks sympathetic. "TURN BACK TO SMART TONY?"

"Yeth." Tony nods and his tail waves in agreement. He concentrates really hard. "I want to. But I need help." Surprisingly, it doesn't hurt that much to say it. "I can't do it by mythelf."

***

The quinjet is familiar, and it isn't. It's noisier than he remembered, and colder, even after Steve gives Tony a blanket to wrap around himself. Tony's a little jealous that they had clothes for Bruce once he came back from being Hulk, but all Tony could put on was a shirt of Steve's, and even that feels strange against the ridge of fur growing down his spine. He pulls his legs up tight on the seat and tries to ignore the others staring at him. Steve is sitting across from him and Tony wishes he'd sit between Tony and the two... and... Natasha! yes, that's her name. Natasha and...Clint. Steve is... he just wishes Steve was closer.

Bruce finishes talking very quietly to Steve and then comes over and sits next to Tony. "Do you have any idea how you came to be... like this?"

Tony's whiskers fan out. "The man with glowing handth did it to me." He blinks, thinking hard. "Hammer called him a freak."

"A mutant," Natasha says. Tony hisses at her voice, suddenly coming after her staring silently at him.

"Or magic," Clint puts in from the front, where he's flying the quinjet. Tony's ears flatten and he shifts closer to Bruce. Maybe Bruce will protect him, maybe he won't, but the Hulk would. Tony is sure of that. 

"We have to find that man," Steve says. He sighs. They had looked, but after landing the quinjet in the middle of the street, and then Hulk ripping the building apart, well, no one with a guilty conscience had hung around to be questioned. And then Bruce had come back and insisted they take Tony back to the lab to run tests. Steve had called Shield, and requested agents investigate.

Tony's ears droop even further. More people trying to fix Tony's mistakes. He shouldn't have got caught. He shouldn't have killed Hammer. Everyone's had to drop everything they were doing to come rescue him. Everyone... not everyone. "Don't tell Pepper!"

Steve frowns. "I'm sure you don't want to worry her, but your fiancée..."

Tony's tail escapes from the blanket and lashes back and forth. "No. Pepper ith my friend. My very good friend, but we're not getting married." Tony laughs. "We broke up becauth I wath too boring!" He grabs the end of his tail to keep it still.

"I can't believe anyone ever accused you of being boring, Tony," Steve says. He's smiling. Tony forgets about his teeth and smiles back. Steve doesn't flinch. "You're the least boring person I've ever met."

***

The lab is even colder than the quinjet. Bruce draws blood and does other tests, and goes into a scientific fugue where Tony could be a fire-breathing dragon and Bruce would barely notice. Being a fire-breathing dragon would be nice. He would be warm. He had put on a robe, but his tail keeps waving and letting cold air in, so it's not all that much help. 

His ears lift and twitch as he hears Steve enter the lab. Steve's footsteps are easy to recognize. Tony looks up from the hologram he's toying with. His fingers don't have the same range of motion as before and it keeps confusing the sensors, so even what he _thinks_ he can do, he can't do. "Hey, Theve, any newth?" 

"There's a few leads. Shield is following them." Steve holds out a mug. Tony can smell coffee. It should smell great, but it doesn't. But he wants to be polite. And it's hot, he can see the steam rising from it.

"Thankth." Tony takes the mug, being careful with his claws. He warms his hands with it, and tries to convince himself that it smells great.

"Tony? You don't want it?" Steve looks puzzled, and well he should. He'd got into the habit of making extra coffee and bringing Tony a mug down in the workshop, and staying to watch for a while. Sometimes he'd sketch. Sometimes he'd play with the bots. Sometimes he'd offer fairly shrewd commentary on style or ergodynamics, even before he knew the word. Tony always gulped half the cup at once, before setting it aside to finish cooling. Now he frowns and shakes his head.

"No. I thought I did. It'th hot. But it..." He waves at his nose and extends the mug back towards Steve.

"Oh!" Steve takes the mug. "Ok, yeah, I guess it's not good for you right now. How about some hot milk?" Steve asks hesitantly, as if Tony would mock him.

Tony can't help it, his ears prick up and his whiskers spread forward. Steve chuckles and puts his arm around Tony. Tony is surprised, but pleased. Steve is even warmer than Bruce, and he smells great. "Bruth, do you need me?"

Bruce looks up from the holodata he's studying and blinks, vaguely. "No. Not now. But I'll want you in an hour to do more tests. I want to see if there are any changes."

Tony nods. An hour is a long time. Tony can get warm. And maybe have a nap, because he's bored and there's nothing he can do.

 

The hot milk is good, but sitting on the kitchen stool is uncomfortable. "I'm juth gonna go," Tony pauses, he knows how 'sit' would come out. "The couth. Drink it there." Tony isn't surprised that Steve follows him. Steve takes being a leader seriously. Tony sits down and tries to find some way of sitting that's reasonably dignified, and doesn't put pressure on his tail. 

Steve sits next to him, close enough that Tony can lean on him. "Movie?" Steve asks.

"Thure." Tony appreciates that Steve's not making a big deal of the cat thing. The milk is warm and his tail isn't crushed. Bruce is working hard, and Tony has faith in his abilities, and despite everything, he has a sneaking faith in Nick Fury-- at least in his ability to track down and capture _anyone_. He got Bruce, didn't he? So a guy with glowing hands who turns people into pussycats shouldn't stand a chance. Tony is going to treat his slow-thinking catness as an enforced vacation from his brilliance. And not freak out.

"Jarvis," Steve says, "Please play us something light. A comedy."

The opening credits for 'Animal House' begin playing on the large flatscreen. Tony grins. "Hey, Clint! It'th your favorite movie!"

"It better not be 'Men in Tights' again, Tony," Clint says as he appears out of nowhere to stand behind the couch. "Oh, hey, 'Animal House'. Great, I'll get the popcorn."

Natasha is sitting on the couch on the other side of Tony by the time his head turns back from looking at Clint. Tony's fur fluffs out and his tail gives a warning thump on the couch. She gives him a steady look. Tony shrugs. "I can't help it. It doth that on ith own." He's pretty sure she's not going to hit him, but just in case he edges closer to Steve, who puts an arm around him.

She takes off her boots and puts her feet up on the table. "Relax, Tony. If I was going to be angry at your body reacting to my presence, I would have killed you a long time ago."

"Huh. All right." 

Clint returns with several bowls full of popcorn. Tony discovers that his claws work excellently at spearing kernels. He also discovers that after Steve's initial surprise at the college boy humor, he's laughing along with the rest of them, and doesn't even frown at the bad boy antics of Delta house. 

Partway through the movie, Tony's ears swivel and he identifies the sound of Bruce's footsteps. He's enjoying the movie even though the colors are weird, so he doesn't look up. 

"Tony. It's been an hour."

"Hey, Bruth." Tony's tail thumps against Steve's leg. He knows the sample collection needs to be done for his own good, but he doesn't want to go back into that cold, smelly lab. "Gimme a few minuth? Juth until the movieth over?"

Bruce glances at the flat-screen. "Sorry, I need the samples now, not forty minutes from now."

"We can pause it," Clint unexpectedly volunteers. They're in the middle of a scene; it'll spoil the momentum. Clint always grumbles about that; if anyone needs to take a break they'd got used to just missing it, as if they were watching broadcast TV in the olden days, before even TiVo, which were after Steve's time, so the newer olden days, and parsing this, even in his head, is confusing Tony. He blinks at Clint. 

"We can?"

"Yeah, sure." Clint grabs the manual remote and hits pause right in the middle of Bluto doing something very funny. 

Tony reluctantly pushes away from Steve's very warm, very firm, chest- better than Tony's orthopedic mattress. His tail and ears droop. The lab is cold and smelly, and he'll have to stay until Bruce is sure the samples don't inspire him to do other tests.

"Want some more hot milk?" Steve says, and honestly, Tony thinks he should be ashamed at how he visibly perks up at that, but it's just so nice having someone care about his comfort.

"Yeah, thankth, Theve." Tony goes off with Bruce, and while there is some ear-flattening, tail-thumping, and one embarrassing howl, Tony lets Bruce take all his samples. Steve shows up a few minutes after they start, with not only a mug of warm milk, but a tuna fish sandwich on buttered toast. 

Tony smiles at Steve. His chest is full of an unfamiliar feeling. It rises into his throat, and he feels for a moment as if he's going to sing, but what emerges is...

Bruce looks up at the sound. "Huh, your laryngeal tissue is vibrating, Tony."

Tony looks at Bruce, puzzled. Biology was never his strong suit. Squishy sciences can be mathematically described, but there are so many more fun uses for numbers.

"You're purring," Steve says. He's smiling brightly. "I guess you really like tuna."

Tony grins and takes the plate from Steve. "Alwath did." Steve stays while Tony eats, and he talks to him about little things he's been doing in his off hours. Really, Avenging is a part-time gig, like volunteer firemen in a small town. Steve's been taking classes in commercial art, and joined a gym where everyone is polite enough to pretend they don't know who he is. He does a lot of walking, enjoying the fact that no neighborhood is off-limits to him, and is making a hobby of trying out small bakeries and cafes. Sometimes he takes his motorcycle for an aimless ride out of the city, but mostly he's just getting reacquainted with New York.

Finally Bruce declares his sampling needs sated. "There don't seem to be any on-going changes that I can detect. It's all within the range of statistical sampling error." 

Tony's tail flicks as he contemplates this news. "Tho. I'm not getting more catty, but I'm not turning human again, either?"

Bruce takes off his glasses and wipes them. "Yeah. You're stable, which is good. But I haven't a clue as to the mechanism of change. There's no trace of radiation, and the only drugs in your system were the degraded fractions from a sedative. Your genes are... well, they've only just completed the first assembly, annotation, and comparative analysis of the domestic cat genome on a single cat so I don't have a full range for comparison. Jarvis is collating similarities now. Of course, being mammals with a common ancestral tree going back to the proto-mammal in the Mesozoic..." Tony glances at Steve and is relieved to see that he's not understanding this either.

"Look, I get it. I'm part cat and you can't change me back. Fine. I'm going to go watch a movie." Tony pats Bruce on the back. "Fury will find that guy and you can thudy _him._ " Damn, he _almost_ avoided 'ess' words. The lisp is annoying. It makes Tony sound stupid. More stupid.

"Yeah. Sure, Fury will get him. We'll figure this out, Tony." 

"I know." Bruce is a good guy. He's got Tony's back. It's a comfort to him when Bruce and Steve return with him to the living room. Natasha and Clint are still there, but the popcorn is gone. Tony isn't hungry, so he doesn't care. Steve sits down and Tony slumps onto the couch next to him. His tail's still flicking a bit; the sampling had been hard on his nerves despite Bruce's efforts to be calm and gentle. Tony can hurt himself, that's fine, but other people jabbing and scraping at him always made him tense, and that was before his nervous system got ramped up. He tries to get into the movie, but his eyelids are very heavy, and the sound is becoming a pointless drone.

"C'mere," Steve says after a couple of minutes and tugs on Tony's shoulder.

It's too much bother to ask where he's going, and a moment later his head is resting on Steve's lap, which is nicer than the couch. "Warm," Tony mutters and breathes a deep sigh. His ears and tail finally relax. Natasha says something, but it's soft and non-threatening, so his whiskers barely twitch. He puts his hand over his eyes to cut out the last of the flickering wrong color light from the movie. Something warm and firm is moving over his hair. Oh. Steve's hand. That's nice. Tony's chest bubbles up into a throaty purr. Everything's all right. He can rest his eyes for just a minute. Clint is saying something. It sounds like he's laughing. Steve answers, a deep, comforting chest rumble. It's all good, even when he smells Natasha coming close and feels his feet being picked up from the floor and arranged more comfortably on the couch. Someone strokes his tail, which he considers being annoyed at, but it's too much trouble. 

 

Tony looks around. The movie is over, the room is comfortably dim, and the others are gone, but someone put a pillow under his head and a fluffy blanket over him. He sits up and has a good long stretch. His tail feels odd. He turns until he can grab it. "Funny, Clint." Tony takes off the shiny gold bow and tosses it onto the table. He's not really annoyed, because Clint's the type to draw on your face if you fall asleep. A bow is mild. Just in case, he goes to the nearest mirror and checks. Fuzzy black ears, long black whiskers, weird-shaped pupils. But no body part cartoons.

His mind feels a little clearer. Maybe he can get something accomplished. He heads down to his workshop. "Daddy'th home," he says and steps forward, only to bump his nose against the security glass door. "Hey, Jarvith! Let me in."

Jarvis sounds apologetic. "You recall, sir, that after a certain episode of which I am not permitted to speak, access was made beyond my control. You must be recognized by the auto-systems in order to gain access. Your voice print is significantly altered."

"Oh, yeah." Tony had forgot that somewhere along the way while he was having a self-pitying post-Pepper binge, Jarvis had let her in, citing some pussy... no. Some _wimpy_ worry about alcohol toxicity. He'd been sick all over Pepper's new Manolo's and quite possibly, although he's not sure about that part, cried. So he'd changed the access. He leans his head against the glass. He can see Dummy and You, and all his shiny, shiny toys. Just out of his reach.

"Retina check?" Tony is looking at his reflection and he's pretty sure he knows the answer before Jarvis speaks.

"I regret that no longer is a match, sir."

Tony sighs and looks at his fingers, stretching out the claws. "Fingerprinth... nah... brain... whatcha callith..." Tony's sure there's a proper word, but he can't think of it.

Jarvis's voice is very gentle. "I'm very sorry, sir."

"LET ME IN!" Tony runs his claws down the glass. It doesn't do any damage, of course, but it makes a satisfying noise. He howls and that's satisfying, too. "MINE! IT'TH MY WORKTHOP!" He's so angry he throws himself against the door, and in general carries on and keeps on attacking the door. Jarvis is talking, but Tony isn't listening to him. 

Big arms wrap around him and lift him from the floor. Tony yells in panic and fights, but he can't get loose. After a few seconds he realizes he's not being hurt, even though his claws have drawn blood. He twists around. "Oh. Theeve." Tony feels his ears droop in embarrassment. "Thorry. I kinda lothth it, there."

"Yeah," Steve says. "Jarvis told me. Look, if you still want to go into your workshop, I can let you in. You gave me access, remember?"

Tony nods. "No. I... I might hurt Dummy or You." It had taken long enough to restore them after their undersea adventure, and they still tended to have panic attacks at the sight of water. Take after their dad. He sighs. "I'm juth tho damn bored."

"We could spar?"

Tony perks up for a moment and then he remembers. "I can't wear the thuit becauth of my tail." And now that he thinks about it, the new shape of his fingers wouldn't work too well in the gauntlets.

"That's fine. You should practice without it sometimes, too."

"I box!"

"With Happy."

Tony narrows his eyes. "You think he gothe eathy on me?"

"Would _you_ go all out against your boss?"

"Yeth!"

"Well, then you won't have any problem sparring with your team leader." Steve lets go of him suddenly as if he's just realized he's still holding Tony.

"Huh. All right, then." Maybe a little exercise is what he needs, and it's not as if he's ever really won against Steve, even with the suit.

 

Tony rips out part of the trouser seam from one of his old track suits to accommodate his tail. He doesn't know why he hadn't thought of that before- the robe had been very drafty. He's a bit sorry that he hadn't grown fur on his chest, to cover up the scars. Pepper had said they didn't bother her, but that didn't mean he wanted Steve to see them and think about how very ordinary and fragile Tony is in comparison to him. He pulls on a black t-shirt after a slight struggle getting it over his ears and thinks about shoes, but... no, toe claws aren't going to fit.

Tony straightens up, pulling himself into a balanced strut as he leaves the dressing area and heads for the gym. He's going to go down in flames, but they're going to be glorious ones. Steve is waiting for him, all tall and tan and smoothly perfect, leaning on the ropes of the ring. Clint and Natasha are sitting on a nearby bench, cooling down from their own workout. Tony's sorry he missed that.

"Hey, Tony," Clint calls, "I bet on you."

Tony's ears come up. "You think I can win?" He's surprised, and flattered.

"Not win, Kotik," Natasha says. She smiles at Tony, which makes him wary. He's not positive what Kotik means, but it sounds too close to 'kitten' for his sense of dignity- admittedly he doesn't have a lot of that, but he does have _some_. "Clint thinks you will cheat by using the power of... what was it..."

"Cute." Clint nods. "Steve's a sucker for cute. See, Tony, all you have to do is act cute, and when Steve is going all 'awww', you knee him."

Natasha rolls her eyes. "And then we pick up pieces of Stark-cat."

Steve is silently laughing; Tony can see it in his eyes, and the twitch at the corner of his mouth. "It won't work," Steve declares.

Tony slides between the ropes, and thinks, 'what the hell'. He widens his eyes and deliberately puts his whiskers and ears in what he's begun thinking of as 'EMO-mode', all droopy. "You don't think I'm cute?" Tony throws in a little hip action, like a kitten readying to pounce.

Steve's eyes widen and darken; his pupils dilate. That's interesting. It's well-lit here, and he's not threatened, so... does he like what he sees? Tony sashays up to Steve, and makes himself look small.

"Tony," Steve says, backing up slightly, his hands raised in appeal, "You're putting me on the spot. There's no right answer to that, is there?"

Tony's tail lashes twice, and he sprints straight for Steve, putting everything he's got into a leap, intending to, not _knee_ , but do some martial arts kicking stuff. He's seen a lot of Jackie Chan movies. It can't be that hard. And he certainly can't hurt Steve, so why not go all out? Why not, it turns out, is because he sails right over Steve's head, landing on the mat behind him in his habitual three-point Iron Man pose, except that Iron Man didn't have a tail.

"Woah," Natasha says, and Tony has a flashback to the day he met her, when she'd taken down Happy despite his much larger size. Could he do that? Everyone's moving in slow motion now in comparison to Tony; Steve is just starting to turn around. Tony jumps again, but this time he lands astride Steve's shoulders, locking his legs around and flinging himself back. Steve teeters and falls forward with a yell of sheer astonishment. Clint is on his feet, Tony sees out of the corner of his eyes; his expression is priceless- total shock.

Tony yowls a battle cry and plasters himself to Steve's back. Steve is moving, trying to get up. Tony sets his fangs into the back of Steve's neck, not breaking the skin, but a warning. This is good. Stay down. Steve smells so good. He's so warm. So nice. Tony wraps his arms around Steve's chest and presses against him, before he suddenly realizes what he's doing. He lets go of Steve as if he's on fire, and jumps back. "Thorry! Thorry, Theve!" The soft material of the track suit is hideously unequal to the task of hiding his erection. He tears off out of the ring, intent on a cold shower and to hell with how he cringes internally from the idea.

 

Tony turns the cold water on in the gym shower and stares at it. Maybe he doesn't have to do this? Sure, he's had a crush on Captain America all his life and he still remembers how helpful a wartime recruitment poster had been at a Very Important Moment in a young man's life. 'Captain America Wants _YOU_ ' with his steady eyes and that beautiful mouth, and all the miles of muscle; all focused on scrawny, socially impossible, Tony experimenting with himself. He looks down at the tent in his trousers. "Not helping. Do not think about Theve."

He takes a deep breath, strips off his shirt and trousers, and steps into the shower. _Not a barrel in Afghanistan. Not the ocean pouring into my suit. Not._ He leans back so the cold water hits his belly and crotch, not his face. Showering with Pepper had been good. She distracted him, made it something to look forward to. _It's only water._ He's in control. He can get out of it any time he wants. He turns and lets the water get at his back; it feels unpleasant going through the soft fur ridge, and worse on his tail, which is absorbing it like cotton wool, becoming so heavy the drag at his spine increases. He leans his head against the shower wall, braced on his folded arms, and closes his eyes. "Don't be a puthy, Tony. Be a man." He laughs a little at that. "Withe I could, Dad." He's shaking all over, and the cold is only an excuse. His ears are pinned down flat, and he hates this, he hates it.

"Tony?"

Tony's head jerks up and he whirls around. At least the icy water has taken care of his libido, but still, his heart is racing. "Theve!" He thinks about apologizing, explaining, lying, but he's too panicked to come up with anything, so he just stares at Steve.

Steve reaches in and shuts off the water. "You're freezing! Come out of there." Steve doesn't sound upset. He pulls Tony out of the shower and wraps a towel around him, then gets another and begins toweling Tony's ears and hair dry. 

This is where Tony draws the line. "I'm not a pet!" He grabs the towel. "You don't have to take care of me!"

"What if I want to, Tony?" Steve licks his lips, and looks uncertain. "What if I've wanted to for months, now?"

"Huh." Tony narrows his eyes. His sodden tail flaps, tangled in wet cotton. "What?"

Steve lets out a long sigh. "This isn't fair, I know. You're not thinking clearly right now, and you probably don't feel that way about me."

"I kinda do," Tony admits. "For a long time. I thought at firth it wath juth... you know, Dad told me thorieth. But then I met you and you're not Captain America. You're Theve." Tony knows he sounds stupid. It's frustrating. He huffs and his whiskers spread forward.

Steve tentatively puts his arm around Tony. "We're going to get you fixed..."

Tony laughs. "Don't thay that."

"What? Oh." Steve blushes. "You know what I mean. We're going to get you back to normal and when we do, we can talk about this... us. See where we want to go with it?"

"Yeah. That thoundth good." Tony has been trying not to check out his goods, but he strongly suspects cats don't just have barbs on their tongues. He really, really doesn't want to confirm this in front of a horrified lover. "Fury getting anywhere?"

"He stopped returning my calls." Steve looks sheepish. "The last I heard, he said they've got someone who can track by scent. Something about 'if you can't beat 'em, recruit 'em'."

"Oh. Put a mutant to trap a mutant." Tony is pleased with himself. He avoided 'ess'. He should probably be more concerned about the hunt for his catnapper, but at the moment getting dry is more important. And getting something to eat. "I could go for a bagel with lox." Tony begins drying his tail; the sensation of rubbing the fur the wrong way is irritating and it makes him hiss.

"I know a good deli." Steve stands up. "I'll go get it right now."

Tony watches Steve leave before he realizes that he could have had it delivered. What's the point of being a billionaire if you have to send out your future boyfriend on a bagel run when you'd rather he stayed and cuddled you? Wait. Tony Stark doesn't do cuddling. Much. He grumbles to himself as he works on the tail.

"You could borrow my blow-dryer," Natasha says from the doorway.

Tony doesn't jump at the sudden voice, because for once he'd heard her approach and had time to make sure the towel around his waist wasn't slipping. He knows where his towel is; according to Ford Prefect a towel has immense psychological value, and it comforts Tony to have even terrycloth armor when approached by a free-roaming assassin. "Why are you being nieth to me? Do I remind you of a cat you had ath a kid?

"I'll get the blow-dryer," Natasha says, without bothering either to confirm or deny. Spies. Never give up any information.

But she _does_ return with the blow drier, and after a moment to accustom himself to the sound, Tony turns his defenseless back to her and lets her efficiently dry the fur, until even his tail is warm and relaxed. "Done," she says at last, turning off the dryer. "And no. I didn't have a cat." She leaves while he's still trying to puzzle out the implications.

Tony puts on a robe and goes to find some new clothes to customize with tail venting. Clint is arguing good-naturedly with Natasha over which of them has won the bet. The stakes are high; the winner is to fill out the next two mission reports for both of them.

 

Tony is halfway through the best bagel with lox he's ever eaten (he can't decide whether it's because things taste different to him now, or maybe Steve just has the greatest deli-fu ever) when Bruce comes into the room. He stops dead and raises his eyebrows. Possibly this is because Tony is sitting on Steve's lap, with his tail curved around Steve's waist. Either that or he has ethical objections to lox.

"Um," Bruce says. "I could come back later?"

"There's plenty of lox," Steve says.

Bruce hesitates and then shrugs and goes over to the kitchen island to slice tomato and onion. Tony omitted them on his. "So, is this a cat-thing?"

"No, I alwayth liked lox," Tony replies. His tail tickles Steve's forearm.

"Uh huh." Bruce sits down with his assembled sandwich.

Clint and Natasha come in, no doubt drawn by sneaky, mysterious, spy ways. Like listening when Steve announced that he'd come back from the deli and had plenty to go around. They should have pretended not to hear, so Tony would have all the lox, and all the Steve, for himself.

Clint stops, too. But only for a moment, to whip out his cell phone and take a photo. "So, who gets the shovel talk?"

Steve sighs. "Neither of us. We're all adults here."

"Some of us," Natasha says, making a beeline for the cream cheese and bag of bagels. "Shovel talks are stupid. Why warn your victim?"

Clint nods. "You're absolutely right." Clint grabs a knife and begins slicing bagels. 

Bruce pours himself a glass of Pinot Grigio and settles down to eat. He says quietly, "The Other Guy doesn't like shovel talks, either." Bruce smiles meditatively. "But if I had to guess, he'd be really unhappy if anything bad happened to Tony or Steve." Bruce sips his wine. 

Tony munches on his bagel and purrs. It's nice to have friends, even if they do have weird ways of expressing it.

***

As the search for the mutant goes into the third day Tony is bored, and also frustrated. When he didn't think a relationship with Steve was possible, it wasn't too hard to concentrate on other things. Only now that it could happen, it can't, and you know, Tony Stark is not a man used to resisting temptation. And the way he is now, he has to keep reminding himself that a quick, mindless, fuck isn't what he wants. No matter how good Steve smells.

It's also annoying that he can't even get drunk. At least Brewer's Droop would solve one embarrassing aspect of the situation.

"Hey!" Tony turns to Bruce. Lately, everyone's been staying close, trying to reassure him and keep him from totally losing it, so turning from his mug of hot milk to find Bruce sitting nearby, pretending to read a book, isn't unusual. "Bruth! Got any catnip?"

"I would ask why you want to know, but it seems fairly obvious." Bruce shakes his head. "Even if it worked on you the way it does on cats, it's not a depressant like alcohol. It's more like... an aphrodisiac."

"Oh. Yeah, that'th not helpful. At all." Tony sits down on the couch and pulls his tail around to keep it under control. "Bruth! Talk thienth!" He flings himself backwards and looks up at Bruce. He can't understand much, but it feels familiar.

"All right." Bruce takes off his glasses and begins talking about the effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, or something like that. Bruce's voice is a steady, soothing drone. Tony closes his eyes and lets it calm him.

 

Something stinks, stinks like something wild and dangerous. Tony wakes up and is on his feet before his eyes are open, hands spread with all his claws fully extended. There's a man, two men... standing in his living room. _His!_ He growls and shifts his feet, preparing to drive the intruders away.

"Hey, Bub," the shorter, shaggier, man says around a chewed, but unlit, cigar. "Brought you a present. Show a little gratitude, will ya?" His arm, corded with muscle, flings the taller man to the floor. Tony belatedly notices that the man is handcuffed and looks considerably the worse for wear. Shaggy cigar-chewer nudges his captive with one foot. "You're givin' us mutants a bad name, turnin' people into pets for money. At least Magneto's got feelin's, nutty as they are."

"That'th him?" Tony hadn't got a good look at the catnapper, being fully occupied with Hammer at the time. 

Cigar-chewer grins. "He tried to make a monkey out of me. Didn't take."

"Where'th everyone?" 

"Asleep. Look, this is an under the table deal. Your Fury called in my Professor and they put their bald heads together and decided mutants should handle mutants. So once your fairy godmother here fixes you up, I'm taking him with me, no records, no big splash in the news, no witnesses. You got it?"

"Got it." Tony nods. "What do I do?"

"Just let him touch your skin."

Tony walks over to the man lying on the floor. "That'th it?" Cold, ice-cold, burning in hell ice cold, hands grab his ankle, and Tony screams. Dimly he hears cigar-man's voice. "Yeah. Forgot to say. It'll hurt like a son of a bitch."

 

"Tony? Are you all right?" 

That's Steve's voice. Tony feels like a nanoball that's been flung into a cement mixer. Very confused, but trying to pull himself together. He opens his eyes and shakes his head. It feels lighter. He reaches up and normal fingers meet normal ears. "Yes! Oh, God, I can say 'ess'. Sassy Stark Survives! News at seven!" Tony sits up and grins at the assembled audience. All the Avengers are there, except for Thor, of course. Problems at home, which is why he'd missed all the pussyfooting. And damn, it's nice to be able to think clearly and remember that.

"What happened?" Bruce asks. 

"Santa came early. A cigar-smoking, mutton-chopped, Santa."

"Santa." Bruce narrows his eyes. "Maybe we'd better check you out, Tony. See if the reversion has had any side-effects."

"I'm fine. Shining, shimmering, splendid." Tony gets up, allowing Steve to lend him a hand. He leans against Steve for support. He's a little off-balance, having got used to the tail. His ass feels so much lighter. "No, really, you know the bloodhound Fury had outsourced?"

"Oh," Natasha says, "he found the mutant?"

Tony nods. "Apparently the good-guy mutants don't like bad-guy mutants giving them a bad name. Sorry, Bruce, we don't get to study him."

"Well, that's probably for the best." Bruce sounds only a little disappointed. "The last time I experimented with metamorphosis didn't turn out so well."

Clint breaks up the awkward moment (Bruce's quiet emo is always awkward) by saying, "Hey! You know what this means, Tony?"

"No, what?" Tony is distracted. He's still holding Steve's hand. Steve doesn't seem to mind.

"Booze! You can drink again. We need to party!"

"Later," Steve says firmly, and yes, Tony is standing in a position to be sure of Steve's firmness; his tail-vented trousers are pressing against Steve's crotch. "Why don't you guys make the arrangements for a wingding? Tony and I are going to...um..."

"Have a debriefing!" Tony says brightly. "We're going to have a long, hard, serious, head to head."

"That's more than we needed to know, thank you, Stark," Natasha says. 

"I've reverted to Stark again? No more Ms. Nice Spy?" 

"In your dreams." But Natasha smiles.

Clint says, "I'll just put the party supplies on your tab, right?"

"Don't you always?" Tony says over his shoulder. Steve is pushing him towards the exit with some urgency. 

 

Steve's bed is huge. Tony is glad that his consideration for Super-Soldier size is going to benefit him personally. "So, this is where we have a serious relationship discussion? I gotta warn you, I've never actually managed to stay awake for anything like that." He sits on Steve's bed and bounces, experimentally.

"Well, I've never actually had a 'relationship talk'," Steve says. He sits next to Tony and takes his hand. "When I was a boy, being a guy who liked other guys wasn't a big deal. Heck, they had joke songs about it. Mae West wrote a box-office hit about it in 1927. I couldn't afford a ticket, but I would have gone, if I could. I always knew I liked guys _and_ dolls."

"Huh," Tony tightens his grip on Steve's hand. "Me, too."

"Thought so." Steve's other hand cards through Tony's hair, not quite the same way he petted Tony when he was feeling feline. "Anyway, come the '30's the fussy-pants got in an uproar, and they closed the pansy clubs, and made the gay actors either retire or hide who they loved. I remember William Haines... god, he was so good-looking. He quit acting in 1935 rather than deny his lover, Jimmie Shields. Everyone knew about them. It wasn't right. It wasn't any more right than any other kind of bullying." Steve lifts his chin and scowls.

"Noble looks good on you." Tony is tempted to kiss Steve, but he is trying to be patient. "So, did you ever find out what happened to your movie idol?" Tony is only teasing a little. 

Steve smiles. "Yeah. He and Mr. Shields ran an interior design business. His friends in Hollywood didn't forget him so it was a success. He served in the war; that's where I met him. It was funny, we traded autographs." He sighs. "I didn't... I haven't looked to see what happened to him, to everyone, after I ... got back. I like to think he made it and got home to his lover."

"So. That's what you're looking for? Someone to come home to?"

"Yeah. And I think you might be that someone. If not... well, if you just wanna have a little fun, then ok. But tell me now. What do you want, Tony?"

"I think... I want the same thing. I tried, you know. With Pepper. But we had too long a history, and we changed, and... it just all fell apart when we weren't looking. It wasn't even anything dramatic." Tony grimaces. "God, feelings. Could we just have sex now? No one is going to make Iron Man or Captain America retire even if we kiss in Times Square."

Steve laughs. "All right." He turns and kisses Tony. It's nice, very nice. Steve isn't shy, and he isn't rough, he just knows what he wants. He's got big, strong hands, but they're gentle.

"Warm," Tony mutters against Steve's mouth, just to hear him laugh. Tony likes wild, frantic sex, but there's a time and place for gentle exploration, too. He starts unbuttoning Steve's shirt. 

"Hot. You make me hot, Tony, you always have." Steve tugs at Tony's shirt, pausing when Tony stiffens, and not in the right place. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Go on." Steve _looks_ at Tony and he can see this is going to degenerate into more feelings talk if he doesn't do something quick. He pulls off his t-shirt and goes for Steve's shirt- with any luck he can _accidentally_ destroy that plaid monstrosity. 

Steve lays both palms across the scars on Tony's chest, stilling him. He doesn't say anything sentimental, or life-affirming, thank God. He just says, "Does it hurt when I touch you here?"

"Nah, I'm good." 

Steve kisses Tony again and then leans back a little to smile at him. "I like kissing. We didn't... you know, sex was one thing, but kissing was sissy."

"Yeah? Doesn't have to be. You can be rough; I kinda like it that way." Tony kisses Steve, aggressively, with a hint of teeth. Steve obviously likes that, judging by his gasp and the heavy twitch of the cock trying to bore a hole in Tony's belly. "I like," he says, nibbling and sucking his way down Steve's neck, "having a little," another bite, hard enough to leave a white imprint that rapidly turns pink, "reminder the next day."

Steve moans and grabs at Tony's hair, tugging on it. "Oh, yeah. I used to... mark so easy. Now nothing sticks." Steve sounds regretful.

Tony laughs against Steve's t-shirt covered abs. "Well, we'll just have to refresh your memory the old-fashioned way." A lick, and Steve shudders. "Do you wanna fuck me against the wall? I'm good with that, I really, really am." Somewhere along the line, 'gentle exploration' has been kicked to the curb. There's no sense in clinging to an outmoded hypothesis.

"Next time," Steve says. He finishes unbuttoning his shirt and drops it on the floor. He's got on a SHIELD-issue t-shirt underneath. Tony laughs at the sight, even though he's not complaining at all about the fact that it's at least two sizes too small.

"What kind of secret organization puts a logo on underwear? C'mon, get rid of that thing, I bet Fury has spy-eyes sewn into it." Tony tugs at Steve's shirt. "Is this painted on?"

"They didn't have anything in my size." Steve pulls off the t-shirt and tosses it in the general direction of the plaid button-down.

"Mmm hmm." Tony is thinking 'acres and acres and it's all mine'. "Your pants seem to have shrunk, too." He palms Steve's crotch for emphasis.

"At least they're not ventilated." Steve slides his hand down the seat of Tony's trousers, finding the ripped seam and tracing the cleft between. Tailed Tony had been forced to go commando, of course. "You like this?" He presses a big, blunt finger down to rub against Tony's hole.

"Hell, yes." Tony spreads his legs a little. "Just let me get out of this."

"What if I want to take you like this?" Steve's eyes are dark and his mouth is damp. There's a warm red flush across his chest, rising through the pillar of his throat and up into his face. 

"Steve! You're kinky! I love it." Tony unzips, but doesn't undo the button at the top of his waistband. "You've got slick?"

"Yeah, sure." Steve fondles Tony's ass for a few more seconds before he gets up and goes to the night stand to pull out a container of Swiss Navy Silicone. He smirks at Tony's raised eyebrows. "What were you expecting, goose grease? I don't have any rubbers, though. Didn't count on needing them."

Tony thinks about it for a few seconds, with what brain function isn't given over to anticipation. "Can you get sick?"

"They say I can't. I never did, anyway."

"I'm clean, just so you know. I wouldn't risk Pepper, and after her, it's just been me and Dexter." Tony holds up his right hand for illustration purposes.

Steve nods. "They tested me for everything, including the 1918 influenza. And I haven't..." Steve shrugs. "I've been busy."

"Get your pants off and get busy with me." Tony lies back on the bed and strikes a filthy pose, with his cock poking up from his trousers. "Look, a helicopter!" He gives himself a squeeze and a stroke, and old faithful jerks in a half circle to the right.

"You're so shy, I don't know." Steve gets out of his trousers and his boxers, which at least aren't SHIELD-approved, but Tony suspects that if he were to look, the label on the blue plaid would say 'Fruit of the Loom'. "I wouldn't want to be corrupting a minor. You're so much younger than me, after all." Steve is grinning a wicked grin.

"Come here, you dirty old man." Tony throws his arms wide. "Give me the benefit of your vast experience." Tony points at Steve's groin. "Vast."

Steve pounces on Tony, making the whole bed shake under the impact. "Do you always talk this much?" He hits the Swiss Navy pump one-handed and generously slicks up the fingers of his other hand.

"Not always." Tony arches up to rub against Steve. "Shut me up."

"I can do that." Steve kisses Tony, and no, there's nothing sissy about the hungry way he claims Tony's mouth and then licks his way inside. Tony moans, and cooperates as Steve shoves a pillow under his hips and pushes his legs back out of the way. It's been a while since he's done this and Tony has a fleeting worry that Steve will become impatient with the prep, but Steve is still kissing him, hot and eager, and using his free hand to stroke over Tony's chest and shoulders.

"God, you're built like a brick shithouse."

Tony can't help it, the awe and admiration in Steve's voice makes him laugh. "Me? You're saying that to me?"

Steve nips a warning bite into Tony's shoulder. "You're like one of the guys from the Physique magazines, only... real. You didn't get your muscles in a fancy gym, or... or from a bottle."

"Steve." Tony shakes his head. "I didn't mean it."

"I know. Now shut up." Steve punctuates his order by adding another finger going where... well, Tony wouldn't say _no_ man has gone before, but not all that many, and not recently. That doesn't actually shut Tony up, but the noises he makes are non-verbal. Tony locks his legs around Steve's ridiculously narrow waist; seriously, the man is built like an upside-down triangle. This changes the angle and makes it easier for him to rub against Steve. So smooth and firm. Somehow he'd always imagined that Captain America was as furry as a shag carpet; all that testosterone, you know? 

Finally, finally, Steve enters, pushing in one long, smooth thrust. Tony squeezes his own cock to distract himself from the initial discomfort. Steve looks at him, braced with his elbows locked tight. From this distance Tony can see the muscle shivering under his skin, fighting against Steve's self-restraint. Tony nods, at the moment unable to draw breath to speak. 

They try to make it last, but days of frustration and stress on top of prolonged deprivation take their toll, and all too soon it's over. Tony's not even sure which of them had come first. He lies there, all hot and sweaty and crushed under Steve's weight for several minutes before he gets the energy to do anything. After a couple abortive attempts, he raises his right hand enough to pat Steve on the back.

Steve makes an enquiring sort of noise, half muffled by a pillow. Tony pats him again.

"Oh. Yeah. Forgot." Steve disentangles himself from Tony and lies down on his side next to him.

Tony just breathes for a moment. "Forgot what?" Steve is close enough to hug, but Tony's body isn't quite that ambitious yet.

"Forgot I'm not a 97 pound weakling any more." Steve makes a fist and poses as dramatically as he can, without getting up.

Tony narrows his eyes and points an accusing finger. "Charles Atlas?"

"Dynamic Tension!" Steve chuckles. "Yeah, I gambled a three cent stamp."

"Postage went up," Tony remarks. He strikes a matching pose. 

Steve laughs and strokes his hand down Tony's biceps. "Thank you, Charles Atlas."

Tony is absurdly happy, too happy not to express it. It bubbles up in his chest, like laughter.

"You're purring again," Steve says.

"I'll do it as long as you keep on rubbing me the right way," Tony says with a grin.

"Yeah." Steve smiles and pulls Tony close for a kiss. "I can do that."

**Author's Note:**

> [ The prompt.](http://avengerkink.livejournal.com/11264.html?thread=26582272#t26582272)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> _I'm basing this off a picture I saw._
> 
> _Tony is kidnapped by an organization who splices human DNA with animal DNA to create hybrids---humans with animal characteristics and instincts---and then sells them as pets on the black market. SHEILD finds Tony, but he's already undergone a change. He now has black cat ears and a tail. His pupils are slit like a feline's and even his tongue his rough._
> 
> _He's still Tony, but he's skittish, embarrassed, and angry by the change. When his emotions run wild, he finds himself hissing, his hair stands on end, and his fingers curl themselves into claws. Steve and the other Avengers do their best to make things as normal as possible and show Tony that no matter what he looks like, they'll always consider him family._
> 
> _Bonus points of Steve stumbles upon Tony's ability to purr._
> 
> (I'm pretty sure this gif is the image the prompter had seen.  
> [ Tony with wiggly black cat ears)](http://www.pinterest.com/pin/175429347957029142)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Ferrous Feline](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3072620) by [RsCreighton](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RsCreighton/pseuds/RsCreighton)




End file.
